THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, June 18, 1995 TAG: 9506160217
SECTION: CAROLINA COAST PAGE: 08 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Cover Story
SOURCE: BY ELIZABETH THIEL, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Long : 121 lines
THE MOON casts a silvery glow over an otherwise black night, revealing a shadowy landscape of sand dunes and sea brush. The sweet-smelling wind envelopes bare skin, supplanting an assaulting heat. The ocean sighs within earshot.
For a moment, or somewhat more, I forget about the sweat that has erupted and pooled and pasted my clothes to my body. I stop worrying about the bugs of all persuasions, searching for new flesh upon which to feast.
It is nirvana.
It is the perfect joy sought by everyone who forgoes the solid comfort of a hotel room to sleep inside a thin, nylon shelter on the hard ground.
Camping is perhaps the purest way to experience the Outer Banks.
Evidently, many other travelers agree. Last year, nearly 106,300 people stayed at the National Park Service's campgrounds at Oregon Inlet, Buxton, Frisco and Ocracoke. Visitors also support the 15 or so private campgrounds on Hatteras Island and Ocracoke.
``I think it's as much for economic reasons as for the experience of camping,'' said Park Service spokesman Robert E. Woody.
The fee for a night at the Park Service's campgrounds is only $12, except for the Ocracoke site, which is $1 more because it is the only one that takes reservations.
``I sleep in hotels when I'm on trips for work,'' said Daniel Dery, 28, a traveling salesman from Quebec, Canada, who vacationed with his family last week at the Park Service's Buxton campground, next to the Cape Hatteras lighthouse. ``I camp when I'm on vacation. And camping is much less expensive, so we can afford to stay longer.''
Campers don't seem to be daunted by heat or harsh weather. The most popular months at the Park Service grounds last year were also the hottest - June, July and August, Woody said.
Louise Drouin, 37, drove 22 hours from Montreal, Canada, last week with her two children and her sister to camp at Buxton. Harsh winds straggling from a surprise early-season hurricane named Allison buffeted their eight-person tent, finally snapping the stakes and tent poles the second night they were there.
The family rushed to a nearby hotel to escape the rain and wind. The next day, a sympathetic ranger loaned them a smaller tent to use for the duration of their vacation.
Woody said of the rangers who oversee the campgrounds, ``We try to get friendly ones.''
Drouin said the experience with the bad weather had not turned her off to camping on the Outer Banks.
``We're not very lucky,'' she said. ``But I love it here.
``We hear the sea. It's so calm for us, because we live in a big town with a lot of noise.''
There are a few golden rules for tent camping on the Outer Banks, particularly on Hatteras Island. You'll need strong stakes and perhaps some weighted bags to keep your shelter in place, because the wind is a constant and sometimes rough companion.
You'll need lots of bug repellent, if you want to return with some flesh on your bones.
And you'll need shoes. A friend and I, while walking one night on the beach alongside the Park Service's Frisco campground, had our sandals stolen from the dune head where we had left them. That made navigating the gravel-strewn asphalt road and the burr-laden sand a tricky business. I'm still picking cactus spears out of my left foot.
``You have to not mind the heat, and be able to get up with the sun if you're going to beach camp in the summer,'' Dery said. ``It's too hot to stay inside (the tent) after the sun comes up.''
The heat was stifling at times. The Frisco campground offers perhaps the best opportunities for natural shelter; campers can set up in the midst of short, bent trees wizened by the sea air. The Park Service's other sites are more open, like giant fields.
Brenda L. Rous, 33, an accountant from Toronto, Canada, who was camping at the Frisco site last week, said she always brings a large tent to use as a shelter to get away from the bugs and the sun. In case of bad weather, she sleeps in her van.
All of the Park Service's campgrounds also offer cold-water showers and clean bathrooms with running water.
``When it's hot out, you don't need a warm shower anyway,'' Rous said.
Kasia Plewa, 29, from New Jersey, discovered that it was not a good idea to bring her aging parents to the Frisco campground.
``They used to love it,'' Plewa said. ``But in the meantime, I just didn't realize that they got older. Now they perhaps don't like it as much.''
Most campers almost relish the small inconveniences that crop up, like figuring out that it's too hot to build a fire to make s'mores, or that the baked beans require a can opener, which was accidentally left out of the mess kit.
Rous was planning to spend her entire two weeks' vacation camping. ``I love it here,'' she said. ``It's worth the drive.''
``If you go and stay in the motels, then it's basically like you're still at home, you're just going out to eat more,'' Plewa said. ``Camping is more like a vacation, because it's different.''
The payoff is huge. The smell of a grill broiling up dinner. The crickets and birds chirping a free symphony every night. The stars that can be seen through a tent skylight on clear evenings.
We saw a wild bunny, unafraid of our approach, munching on something next to our tent.
Dery summed it up: ``If hot conditions don't bother you - and you like being outdoors - this is the way to go.'' MEMO: Staff writer Lane DeGregory contributed to this story. ILLUSTRATION: Staff photo by DREW C. WILSON
Vacationers, left to right, Sean Korte, Heather Merchant, toddler
Jessica Merchant and Erik Korte dine in a net tent to keep the bugs
away.
Two campers walk through the National Park Service's campground at
Frisco. Camping here is only $11 per night and there's direct access
to the ocean.
Staff writers Lane DeGregory and Elizabeth Thiel prepare to raise
their pup tent while camping at the Park Service's Frisco
campground.
Map of Outer Banks Campgrounds
by CNB